Tag: life experience

What are difficult times really? they are times when you are feeling like you can’t go on, it seems to you like the whole world is caving in and you don’t know what to do. The bills are piling up while your means of paying off are shrinking or maybe a loved one is going through a terminal illness which you know may eventually lead to death and you are at a loss on what to do.

For some, it could also be waiting for the fulfillment of a long-awaited promise or a relationship that has gone bad or maybe the loss of a job or perhaps your home.

Difficult times in life will come to us all, it’s not a matter of if but when, this is because Jesus said in John 16:33, in this world, you will have tribulations, its something that is bound to happen. Its how we handle it that determines whether we sink or swim.

We may not like it, I never saw a person who loved to suffer, but Jesus Christ has already told us, to be of good cheer for he has already overcome the worldand all that is in it. We have an advocate with the Father who has already been through what we have been through and has obtained the victory not necessarily for himself but for us all. He calls us more than conquerors because we didn’t have to fight the fight, he already did that, we just need to begin to take advantage of what he has done for us.

If are you going through difficult times in your life, here are 3 things you should do.

1 Have a good Cry:

I know this may sound shocking to you, I mean how can a Christian be telling you to have a good cry, well Jesus weptat Lazarus’graveside even though he knew that he could raise him up. He still identified with the pain that his friends were going through. The bible says that we have an advocate who has been through what we are going through, he feels what we feel and he knows what we are going through.

I know that when you are going through stuff people tell you to be strong and do not cry, but sometimes crying helps you vent your emotions and gives you the opportunity to begin to heal. So if crying will help you release that pent-up emotion, then, by all means, do so, but do not stop at this stage, don’t just cry over your situation and do nothing about it, rather go to the next stage.

2 Seek the Face of God

I know what it can be like to be a busy mom or perhaps a busy parent, sometimes Life carries us so fast that we fail to cultivate that relationship with God.We don’t have time to pray and read the Bible as we should hence when difficult times hits us, we are at a loss on what to do because we may feel we are not in a place to begin to seek God.

But you know what? God is always there for us, he says in Jeremiah 29: 13, you will find me when you seek me with all your heart. So begin to seek the face of God through prayer and study of his word. You can start by praying first and telling the Lord all we are going through and then asking him to give us answers and show us a way out as we read the Bible.

I remember when I was believing God to conceive again after I had lost a child, my daughter was stillborn, she did not make it out alive due to complications during childbirth. I was in that place where I was in pain but did not know what to do, I lost the child and my own life was also at risk because I had lost so much blood. Every day I lived was a miracle because I did not know if I will make it to the next day.

While I was in the hospital, I was still in so much pain both physically and emotionally, but I kept seeking out Gods word and listening to what he will say to me just like Habakkuk said,I will stand upon my watchand see what he will say to me. One day I had put on a tape that was playing healing scriptures and while listening to it, I heard the scripture in Acts 27:22-25, where Paul was telling the Captain of the Ship he was a prisoner in that they will not lose their lives even though they had lost their possessions.

I knew this scripture was for me because, I had just lost my baby which in this case symbolized possessions in the scripture above, that scripture spoke to my heart and I knew that I will not lose my life. This is one way God speaks to us, when we are in difficult situations, through his word, but you have to be willing to listen and search for his word until you find it.

3 Take God’s word and act on it

After seeking Gods face and you get a word from the Lord, perhaps by his written word or the word of God which he spoke to your heart. (Note that God will not speak a word to you that is outside his word in the Bible), so if you think you heard from God, cross-check the bible to see if he has written it in the Bible. Its after you have ensured that you have this confirmation that you will take that word and act on it.

What do you mean by acting on word?. It means act like the word you heard is true. Don’t believe the lies of the enemy which he often shows you through your circumstance but rather believe what Gods word says concerning that situation and behave it.

In my own case when I got the word for my healing from that scripture, I began to thank God for my healing and recovery. I did recover and not only did I recover, during the time of my trial, God had given me his word that I will conceive again and the enemy will not be able to take this one.

I did conceive again and of course, the enemy tried again to take that one but he did not succeed. Today I am favored mom to 3 children that God gave to me, his word which he spoke came to pass. In 5 years, God gave me all that I had desired as I believed and acted out his word.

Will I say it was easy to do, no it was not, but I held on to God and he did it for me, that’s why I am using this medium to encourage anyone going through difficult times to hold on to his word, God is too faithful to fail.

PS: This Month of October made it 6 years since my daughter who was still Born went to be with the Lord, but his Faithfulness still remains with me. I dedicate this post to her: Eleora Chimamanda Uchealor.

The word stay at home mom evokes a lot of different pictures in peoples mind, for some, it’s a word used to describe women who don’t like to work but prefer to sit at home and watch movies all day in the name of looking after their kids. I really wish it were so but I do know now it’s not so.

Stay at home mom is a woman who wears all the hats there is in the home plus some more without having the attendant payment to show for it.
When a woman chooses to be a stay at home mom, it’s often a huge sacrifice she has to make in other to see that her home is well run or in other to see that her kids have the kind of training and nurturing that she desires.

Some women have been known to leave lucrative careers to become stay at home moms because the effect of leaving their lovely ones in the hands of other people to care for became too much to bear and therefore they chose that off the career ramp option to care for the most important people in their lives.

For some people it may make sense for others, it may not because after all is said and done, it’s the investment you put in your family that matters most.

Children don’t care if they are in the most expensive house or car or wear the best clothes, as long as their parents were there for them when they needed them most.So today I am going to share with you the 6 things that stay at home mom struggles with because I have been there too and I know what it feels like

.

–Feelings of Inadequacy:

If you are a first-time mom who just chose to stay at home, this may resonate well with you, that feeling of do I know what I just did? I mean I just left my well-paying job to stay home to take care of my baby. Sometimes you may even feel like even the mom job you are not doing so well at it. The truth may also be that at least for your paid job you were well trained but to become a mom, you had no prior training and yet you are expected to be perfect at it.

You feel inadequate because you are trying to cope with having to leave a career that once defined what you could bring to the table at home and then you also have to cope with the fact that your new job does not have any job description attached to it. There is no end to where your job stops, you are the nanny, caregiver, nurse, housecleaner, and any other thing that comes in between including cook, driver, encourager and the list goes on.

While you struggle with coping with all these issues, guess where your report card is shown, at places where you get some judgmental looks or comments for not getting your act together as a mom. From those who think that by giving your child the bottle, you are just being lazy, “every hard working mom should be able to breastfeed exclusively for the first 6 months of a babies life”, does this sound like a familiar jab?, well for me I tried it but it didn’t work, in fact I got sick before it dawned on me that everyone has to find what works for one in this journey of mommyhood.My first son loved the bottle, my daughter liked breastfeeding a lot, in fact, she refused the bottle and went straight to eating solids.

Rider Bike for Kids

So what do you do with all these struggles that you are facing?.I would like you to know, that the first time you start as a new stay at home mom, it will seem strange to you just like when you resume your post on a new job, but with time, you will find your rhythm.From then you can then begin to try out new things and see what works and what doesn’t work, you can then decide to throw out what doesn’t work for you and choose what you are comfortable with. And who says that as you go along you won’t acquire the experience which you can package and sell out to new moms like you for a fee. For how to do that please read my post on how to turn your life experience into a money printing online business

Overworked and Underappreciated:

The interesting thing about being a stay at home mom is that you don’t have a specific work time, from the time your feet hit the floor in the morning time, assuming you had all night sleep which is often a mirage when your kids are between ages of 0-4 years.

Your work is almost like a round the clock work from fixing breakfast, lunch, and dinner to cleaning the home, running errands and shopping. You are practically at work even when others are having a break, no wonder you sometimes feel overwhelmed and overworked.

You may also feel underappreciated when you are not being praised for the work you do at home. Some husbands have been known to come home and say, “ honey what were you doing all day that mydinner is not yet ready”?.

No one understands the many times you have to calm a crying baby or break up siblings quarrels or even act as a judge and jury. It can make you feel like your energy is being sucked out daily, my little advice about this is to find that time to rest during the day, if it means putting the kids to nap in the afternoon and taking your own nap too to get your energy back please do so.
Of course, it may mean that some things won’t get done perhaps a scattered house or unfolded laundry, but like I always say, a grumpy mama is no good to anyone. So always find the time to tune off during the day and just relax. It may not necessarily be sleep, sometimes I find that just sitting and watching cartoons with my little ones helps me to relax. You can also choose to quit trying to have everything in the perfect place in other to feel alright.

Now if you are a hubby reading this, know that appreciation goes a long way to make a stay at home mom’s day better. A night off duty will be nice, a back rub here and a foot massage there will make a world of difference.

Baby Girls Clothing from Nordstrom

–The baby company only:

When you are a SAHM with a baby at home, the only company you will have is that of a kid, while that is lovely I mean who hates the company of her babies, but sometimes you want to have adult conversations. Where you to be working outside your home, you will often meet new people or at least converse with people like yourself but for a stay at home mom, it’s often baby talk all day long until hubby comes home. This might look good some days at least you have some time to think things through and strategize for any project you have on hand without any distractions. Unfortunately, this may not be the case always because the same distractions can come from children too.

So what does a stay at home do in this case, I say in any case be involved in online forums where you can discuss issues that bother you or vent on what you are going through. When time permits, pick up the phone and call a close friend or family member with whom you can spend time discussing with or exchanging ideas with, this will make you feel a lot better. If you are working from home as a blogger or doing any form of online business, belonging to an online group of people of the same challenges as you can help you gain a better perspective of issues you may be dealing with at that particular time.,

Finances:

This aspect of the struggles of a stay at home mom is very controversial, for some, it’s the constant struggle to stretch the money available to cover all the household bills, for some it may be that you didn’t even have enough to last you throughout the month. For some, It may be that you just have just enough but not excess to take care of some niceties that you are used to when you were working outside the home. While for some people finances may not be the problem but just the feeling that you are not earning anything at all and so you are a one income household.

Whichever divide you fall into know that there is a way out of it, working has been redefined so much right now that you can earn your income even while staying at home, if finance is a major issue for you, then consider ways of working from home to earn extra income.

Here are a few options to earn extra income from home. You can start a home business, offer your services as a freelancer from your home by signing up on platforms such as Fiverr, upwork or you can choose to work for other people from home which may entail applying for online jobs that you can do. Which ever way, you choose to do it, there is a way out you don’t have to feel like your finances took a nose dive and you can’t change it.
Sometimes you may discover that starting that home business was what you really needed to take your family off the 9- 5 rat race. If starting a home business is your thing, then consider reading my post on how to choose the right home business for you.

Feeling Left Out:

Have you ever gone for an outing where you bumped into an old school colleague or work mate and you started discussing especially pertaining to your field of study or work and you felt left out because a lot has changed without you being aware? This happens particularly when you are a new mom, for the first one year and especially the first 6 months its like you are underwater, your life is practically buried within fulfilling your babies needs, first-time moms can resonate with this better. If you carry on discussing you may feel like you don’t seem to know the trends that are even going on now, thanks to your new job, stay at home mom Lol, but seriously those feelings of being left out if left unchecked can begin to make you resent your decision.

But before you go feeling sorry for yourself or getting angry, understand that you need to remind yourself the reasons why you made your choice in the first place, and make peace with the fact that you may not know a lot of things that are currently going on in your former field of work due to your new position but you can begin to make amends by building and connecting with people who are on the same journey as you are and understand the challenges.

Keeping up with colleagues from your former field of influence may not be useful to you if you are not planning to continue in that line of career. Realize that you have changed career and focus on what you must do in the now to get you quickly ramped up on the new journey you are on.

It may mean taking courses to get you ready if you want to start a home business or even starting out without training at all that way you learn the hard knocks your own way.

Either way, you are gathering knowledge that will aid your journey as a stay at home mom who wants to work from home. If you have been brainstorming ideas about different types of home businesses you may need to read my post on 5 posts that teach you how to make money online.

The truth is that being a stay at home mom doesn’t mean that you can’t utilize your skills in other ways to earn money. With the advent of blogging these days, all forms of knowledge are now monetizable.

For example, who knew that you could sell your knowledge on how to organize your home, take care of a newborn, keep yourself fit e.tc. In fact, information that used to just sit with you doing nothing has become sources of income.The online media has made it possible to be able to share such information’s now and make good money from it.

–Need for time out

As a stay at home mom, there are times you just feel like you really want a leave, I mean people who work 9-5 have that opportunity of taking a leave to just go home and relax and recharge before going back to work. But for the stay at home mom, she doesn’t get to get that time off.

There are no leave days, where are you leaving to? , your home is supposed to be your leave escape but now you get to stay in it every day and it doesn’t look like it will make for a leave escape anymore. The good thing about this situation is that you don’t have to apply for your leave in other to take one. or technically you can apply to your hubby to take a leave from work and stay home so you could take the much-needed leave in other to refresh and recharge.

You can choose to go out that day with friends and just have a girls day out or better still visit a close family member whom you can relax in her house and feel like you are in your own home and on holiday without the attendant stress of having to care for your home.

Maybe you can go for a mini holiday to a nearby tourist attraction and just spend time alone, pampering and recharging yourself. Of course, there will be a time and place for family vacation but this little time out is for you alone, so you can be a better mother to your kids and give your best to them. Thinking of taking that mini vacation then try using Booking.com, they have excellent services for your vacation needs they have budget hotel rooms if that suits you.

Do you know of any struggles that a stay at home mom has to deal with, leave a comment below, it will be appreciated?

Hello dear, It’s Friday the last working day, well for some people. Today I will be talking about God in the midst of your storm. Storms comes to everyone in this life. So long as you are in this thing called Life, you will sure go through some Storm in your life.

As our lives are different so is our storm, we face different issues in Life everyone to his own, and yet for some people it seems like theirs is the worst, they can’t seem to find a way to handle Life. But we know as Christians that we are not called to handle Life alone, that’s why Jesus said in Matthew 11: 28-29 to bring all your Burdens and Cast it on him.

28 Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.29 Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.

Remember when the ship in which the disciples of Jesus were in was about to sink, Jesus was asleep because he knew who he was and that the storms wouldn’t out beat him. The Disciples were afraid like we are wont to be now, perhaps you have been diagnosed with an incurable disease or maybe you have a burden of debt that is crushing you right now and you are wondering where is Jesus in my storm, why can’t I hear him, remember what he asked the disciples why is it that you have no Faith?( Mark 4:40), how can he be in the boat with you and it will sink except that you have no faith in him and you have forgotten to call on him. Even if your heart is failing because of the problems before you rise up now as you read this Blog Post and say this aloud.

Jesus is with me in my Boat, I will not sink, I will not die of that incurable disease, my Bills will be paid, My debt will be paid off, I will not lose my property, I will not Loose my Child, I will not be put down by circumstances, I will arise and come out of it because he says Fear Not, I will Help you in Isaiah 41:13.

You know that the Lord is so wonderful, during my Morning devotion this morning, I was reading from a Devotional by Derek Prince(Declaring God’s Word, A 365 Day Devotional) on the Fact that God has given us the promise of the father through the holy spirit as it was written in Gal 3: 14. He went on to speak of the fact that the Holy Spirit is the promise of the father and how that through Abraham we had become partakers of that Blessing upon our Lives. I was finding it difficult to fit in what I was going through at the moment with Abraham’s Blessing, I mean how could I be Blessed when I am struggling so much. So I said to myself, let me get another devotional and see what God has to say there, in fact in mind I said I will get a more serious devotional ( LOL)

So I went and Picked up Papa Hagin’sFaith food and when I opened the book to today’s date, guess what I saw, Proverbs 13:22, that a good man leaves an inheritance for his children’s children. It just hit me that today God was affirming to me that he has left an inheritance for me via his word. The Abraham’s Blessings which I was struggling to believe that it’s mine is the inheritance which God has left for me.

I do not have to struggle with Life’s problems because I have a good God and he has left me an inheritance which I am to appropriate as mine. In fact as you read into that devotional he talks about Jesus saying that he can teach us make money through the direction of the Holy Spirit, If only we will not be covetous.

For me that word made meaning to me and had great impact in my life today, I can go about my business asking the Holy Spirit to help me be the best he created me to be. Alleluia. I was so excited by this word that i began to declare God’s blessings over my life and over the work of my hands. I ran to share this scripture with my husband. I read psalm 128 to top it off and I was in a very good mood, set for the day. Wao, Glory to God.

God willed the whole world to Abraham and through him we became partakers of the blessings of Abraham.

So here is the truth, when the storm is billowing, stop looking at the storm and start looking at Jesus the author and finisher of your faith.( Heb 12:2). He is the one the disciples called on to calm the sea,

Begin to proclaim that the storm will not overcome you, open your Mouth and begin to denounce what the enemy is doing in your Life and you will see the storm go away.

Refuse to back down to the Devil and know that you have a divine partner the Holy Spirit whom God gave to you in other to help you through the storms of Life. He will quieten every storm and make all things beautiful in his time.

God Bless you for reading this piece. If you loved it, share it with your Friends .

A post on how to turn your unique life experience into a money-making venture while helping others.

This week starts on a good note, a week in which we celebrate the small business owners. It’s the National Small Business week starting from April 30th to May 6th. The celebration was instituted since 1963 to celebrate the contributions of small business owners to the growth of the American economy. You can read more about their activities here.

Its special to me because I promote and encourage women who are stay at home moms to start small businesses from their homes, it empowers one to live life at its best and according to your own terms.

Nordstrom Shopping

Small business owners create 2 out of every 3 jobs in America today and you can be part of the percentage that is making an impact on the economy. According to a SBA advocacy report, 52% of small businesses in America are home-based businesses, while 78.5% of small businesses are nonemployer businesses( Businesses which have no employees), these are businesses run solely by the owners. This week celebrates the impact of such business on the economy, a testimony to the fact that small business are consistently growing.

The good thing about this trend is that women-owned businesses are growing at a rate 5 times better than other businesses, this is according to a research on the State of women owned businesses. So if you are a stay at home mom or even a working mom who has been thinking about how to ditch your 9-5 to start a home-based business that will meet your needs, there are reports that support the fact that women-owned businesses are on the rise and keeps getting better and better.

For some moms wondering where to start from, know that one of the businesses you can easily start, is an online business which is based on your various experiences in life. According to an article written by Melanie Deziel for INC , it posits that in these days of the information age, creating information products around the subjects you are passionate about is one of the ways you can turn your passion into a 6 figure business.

This is possible because with the internet connecting billions of people on the face of the earth, there are billions of searches for information on how to do things. People are hungry for information and are willing to pay a good amount of money to learn what will move them to the next level. As long as you have skills which you can impart to other people, then you are in business.

Creating a course on how your experience can help some people solve their problems is one of the easiest ways you can make a living from the internet. The good thing about this type of business is the fact that it costs as little as less than a 100 dollars to start.

For example, suppose you already have an idea about helping new moms take care of their little babies or even first-time moms from pregnancy to weaning a child, here is a rundown on what you need to create an online course based on that topic.

Baby Girls Clothing from Nordstrom

What you need to create an online course.

Discover your Niche: Find out what pain points people your niche have a write out solutions to their pain points. This will form the building block of your online course.

Build a followership around this Niche via social media channels like Facebook, Google+, Twitter, Instagram etc.

Start a Blog: Where you can write articles about how your knowledge can help your potential niche. You can get a domain name and a hosting option with a little amount, here is a link Sign up now for hosting

WordPress Installation Guide

Build an email list: Get to the inbox of your followers by offering a free training or eBook to them in exchange for their emails.

Cost of Building you course: 0 dollars, you already have the experience and you can find out how to create the course from google search

Delivery cost: You can deliver your course via webinars, YOUTUBE or email correspondence course or you can use an automated system like Teachable

for a minimum of 39 dollars per month.

Burlington Coat Factory

Cost of the setup of payment channel: 0 dollars you can set up a payment channel for your courses for free your payment channel can be PAYONEER, where you receive payment for your courses without much stress.

Total costs of starting this business: 52 dollars + or -39 dollars if you choose to use Teachable

The extra 48 dollars can be plugged into Google ads if you choose not to use Teachable and choose instead to use the workflow method in the email marketing software of SENDLANE

The Blog issue is easy to start if you are using Jvzoo host, their customer service support is excellent. Their packaging makes it easy for you to get your Blog up and running within the shortest time possible. Sign up now for hosting